WARNING: Contains extremely graphic and disturbing imagery and language, made all the more unsettling in the fact that it is completely true. Seriously, folks, adults only.
It is taboo to speak about a miscarriage. People in general turn their heads away and pretend not to have heard the word, as if the act alone of speaking that word brings a terrible curse upon all those who hear it. In reality, they simply don’t know what to say and rather than giving comfort, a woman who has suffered a miscarriage is typically treated to any number of inappropriate and utterly untrue clichés that will wreck her already broken heart into a million tiny pieces of despair. For lack of any better place to turn, the un-mother runs into the arms of silence and secret. She stuffs the experience down into a magic bottle, seals it with her own deep inner magic, and vows never to release its potent and dangerous little genie, burying it in the depths of her heart, which by now has been reduced to sand, where no one will ever find it.
Only, the bottle refuses to stay buried. It surfaces at horrible times and once again plagues her memory, because some things can never be buried deeply enough to keep them forgotten. Without warning, the un-mother relives every scathing moment of the experience and whatever portion of her heart and mind she has been able to rebuild during the respite of forgetfulness is once again decimated into despair. This is what we un-mothers live with. It is what we will die with. No matter what else happens in our lives, it is there, waiting to spring on us at any moment.
Our only defense is to take hold of it and drag it back from silence and secret. We have to mold it like the artists of creation that we women are and make it part of us in a way that will not drive us into that despair. It is ours and we can do what we will with it. We have to go through the steps of turning it into something not just lost, but into something beautiful and loved. We have to embrace the experience and understand how it permeates us. Only then can we breathe again. Only then can we live again. Only then can we allow ourselves to love again. It begins just like any other process of healing. It begins with the admission that something did in fact happen and we are not going to ignore the pain any longer. It begins with having the strength to say just a few words and letting the rest fall into place. It begins here: My name is KC and I had a miscarriage.
My husband, R and I were married in summer of 2005. It was a turbulent few months, including being in a car accident, losing my job and starting a new one. My son, J (from a previous relationship) turned eight and we were all happily adjusting to being a family. We lived in an apartment and had a cat named Yoda who was certifiably psychotic. We were originally going to wait for a year before trying to have another child, but we had a happy accident right before Thanksgiving. Never let it be said that the pill is fool-proof. A doctor told me later that it is really only about 85% effective. I had sort of figured that out already, thanks.
We spent Thanksgiving with my brother’s family. We had decided not to tell anyone because we had a special way we were going to announce the good news at Christmas. By then, I would be eight weeks along and would have sonogram pictures to show. We intended to pin a small stocking to the front of mine with the sonogram picture inside it. It would, however, be a trick to keep it quiet until then. My cravings were severe and weird and my changes in behavior were significant. As an example, I sat at the hors d’oeuvres table at Thanksgiving and happily began wrapping turkey pepperoni slices around dried apricots and popping them in my mouth. This is not something I would normally do. In fact, I didn’t even realize what I was doing. R leaned over and told me in a whisper that I’d better stop or everyone will know that I’m pregnant without us saying a word.
My eight week sonogram was scheduled for a few days before Christmas. J was staying with my mother for the week before Christmas, so R came with me to my midwife’s office. Because the baby is so small at the eight week mark, it has to be an internal sonogram. We all trouped into the room and got ready to do the sonogram. The midwife, M, began the procedure and began taking her measurements. After a few minutes, she told us to sit tight and went to get the doctor. R and I happily chatted away, oblivious to the rest of the world.
The doctor was a gruff man with a strong accent. He was none too gentle with the sonogram wand, either. As he worked, R and I were talking quietly. M touched my knee and asked “Did you hear what he just said?” I hadn’t been listening to the doctor at all, so I shook my head. “There’s no heartbeat.” He stated bluntly. I think my heart stopped for a few beats. R and I looked at each other, unable to speak.
“What?” I finally managed to spit out.
“There’s no heartbeat.” He repeated, “This baby’s dead.”
He set the sonogram wand on the table and stood up. White shock filled my entire being. It couldn’t be. There had to be a mistake. Maybe we just miscounted the number of weeks. Maybe they had just missed it, like the baby was turned wrong or something. It simply could not be true that there was no heartbeat. I instantly hated the doctor. He was leaving the room without any explanation to soften his last words that hung mercilessly in the air behind him, “This baby’s dead.”
M explained through my tears that they would take blood that day and the next and compare the levels of what she called hCG, the pregnancy hormone. If the count went up, then I was still pregnant and we’d meet back there to figure out what happened. If the count went down, then we would have lost the baby and would have a decision to make about how to proceed. She left R and me alone for a little while in the room to cry.
I went in the next day and the phlebotomist stuck me with another needle. I told her why I was back. She said that sometimes, just sometimes, the sonograms were wrong. At times like that, everyone knows someone who knows someone who has had just that very thing happen to them. I was confused with hope and horror. I don’t know if I believed her.
I called my mother that afternoon. It was the day before Christmas Eve and I remember the conversation pretty clearly. “Mom, I’m pregnant, but—“ Her squeal of delight cut through me like a hot knife. “BUT,” I cut back in, “They said there’s no heartbeat. I need you to pray. Just… pray.” Her part of the conversation continued with all the same arguments that I had been making since the previous morning. Anything is possible with God. Yes, mom, I know it is.
My Aunt M called me later that day. The doctors had told her the same thing with her daughter, who was born fine. They would all pray for us. She knew it just had to be the same with me. Anything is possible with God. Yes, Aunt M, I know it is.
M called me herself the morning of Christmas Eve. “Your hCG levels dropped by about half from what they were at your appointment. I’m so sorry, KC, but your baby has died.” At that moment, so did I.
She explained that my body didn’t understand yet what had happened and that I had to make a choice. I could either have a DNC, which was the same procedure as with an abortion where they put me under and cut the baby out, or I could let it happen naturally. She said that at this stage, letting it happen naturally would be like a really bad period. Given the choice, I could not fathom the thought of a DNC. Being seriously anti-abortion in combination with a vain hope that they were still wrong, I chose to let it happen naturally. She called in a prescription for me for something for the pain, which she said would be severe, and tried again to convince me to go under for a DNC. I insisted on going natural. If I had to be honest with myself, I was terrified of going under anesthesia. If I had a choice, there was no way on God’s green Earth that I was going to allow myself to be put under. So, natural it was.
Other than that, I don’t remember much of the next week. I remember a snapshot image of R and I holding each other and crying. I remember Yoda destroying our carefully decorated Christmas tree with all of our ornaments and garlands that R, J and I had made by hand for our first Christmas tree together. I remember going back to work and sitting at the front desk, hating what I was going to have to do next. I had already told my bosses, the five lawyer partners, that I was expecting. Now I would have to tell them I was no longer pregnant. There was nothing in the world I wanted to do less than that.
L, my supervising partner, finally got off the phone. I stepped tentatively into his office and closed the door. I had no idea what to expect. I didn’t expect him, however, to suggest that I take the following Friday off to be with my family. He said that I should be with my family as much as possible for the next while. I took him up on the offer.
Later, I went into the kitchen to prepare my lunch. DJ, one of the other partners, was sitting at the table reading the newspaper. As I stood with my back to him and punching buttons on the microwave, he asked me an innocent question. His question came from an understanding point of view stemming from the fact that his wife had endured several miscarriages until they finally adopted their son, and he knew that oftentimes there were things that a woman had to do while she was pregnant.
“So, are they having you do anything like standing on your head or riding a bicycle backwards for this pregnancy?”
“No,” I felt my heart catch in my throat, “because I lost the baby.” No sooner were the words out of my mouth than he was out of his seat and wrapping his arms around me. Of course, the tears that were always so close to the surface sprang out of my eyes. Absolutely nothing could have held them back. He only said “I’m sorry,” and left it at that. Here was a man who knew from experience that extra words were just that: extra words. I am grateful to him. He showed me exactly how to react when someone shares the experience with me. Sheer simplicity and silent understanding. That is all that is required or desired.
I took the Friday off as L had suggested, though I felt no different than I had before. I only took it because L gave it. It was like some kind of consolation prize for the grieving. Waiting for the inevitable to begin and hoping against hope that it would not is its own kind of torture. I was still harboring hope that they were wrong and I would find in another month or so that the baby was still alive. Right after the New Year, I realized that regardless of actions or hope or prayers, it was indeed the beginning of the end.
The following Wednesday morning, I began to bleed.
For the record, I like M. I went back to her for the later births of both of my daughters, but beginning late that morning, the only thing I could utter through the penetrating pain was “why didn’t she tell me it would be like this?” What started like a heavy period became waves of contractions in rapid succession with the most intense bleeding I’d ever endured. I turned the phones over to someone else and excused myself to the conference room.
The early afternoon sun shone in through the windows and warmed the place where I crumpled on the floor in a fetal position and sobbed. I had called R and he was coming to bring me my medication and a change of clothes. I couldn’t move. I had put layers of cardboard under me so as not to spoil the carpet, but my clothes were ruined. I didn’t care. I had grudgingly filled the prescription for pain but had left it at home. After all, I had been fine that morning when I left for work. By the time he got there, I was nearly passed out on the floor from lack of blood and throbbing agony. Despite the fact that I had hoped to take some medication, change my clothes, take a few minutes to gather myself and then go back to work, life had other plans. L and DJ sent me home, and it’s a good thing they did. What M had called in for me was Hydrocodone, which rendered me unconscious about fifteen minutes after I took it. R practically carried me in the house, or at least, that’s what he told me. I don’t remember that afternoon or the next couple of days through the medicinally induced coma in which I existed.
On Friday morning, I woke up. The bleeding torrent had quieted to the flow of a heavy period and though I was extraordinarily sad, I was also somewhat relieved that it was finally over. I showered and laid on our bed, my wet hair fanned out around my head on the light blue sheets, leaving darker blue streaks where the water absorbed. Because it is never really over when you take a breath, another wave hit me and it instantly began again, ruining everything around me. R was right with me again, ready this time for the onslaught of emotion. I raged. I lost whatever composure my slight recovery had brought me and I raged. Had I not endured enough? I begged to go back into the oblivion that medicinal sleep had given me. In absence of the intense and persistent pain, however, R didn’t want me to. He was right, but I raged anyway. Instead, we called M and told her that it was over. She told me what to watch for and when to check back in with her. In the meantime, try to return to life as usual. There was a distinct finality to the click of the phone hanging up.
I went back to work the following Monday. No one spoke of the ordeal, though they had witnessed the beginning of it. I think they did not want to upset me. That was okay with me because I was tired of being upset. Since no one said anything to me about it, however, there was no warning to be gleaned from their words that it was not, in fact, over.
January 13th landed on a Friday that year. Everyone jokes about it or knocks on wood or crosses their eyes or does whatever it is they do to ward off the bad vibes that come from Friday the 13th. I’ve never held with the idea of inherent evil in a date on the calendar that probably isn’t completely precise with the workings of the universe anyway. I’m beginning to think that we only happen to remember things that happen on Friday the 13th not because the day made them happen, but because they happen to fall on that day.
I was sitting at my desk and felt something. It felt like the blood clots that I had been passing for more than a week now as my body attempted to clear itself out of what it now considered foreign and unwelcome material. I again passed the phones to someone else and excused myself to the bathroom, just to make sure it wasn’t going to be a problem. When I closed the stall and checked, there was nothing there. It still felt like something was wrong, so I got some toilet paper and wiped. That’s when I knew beyond a doubt that something was wrong. Part of me came away from me, held lightly in the wad of toilet paper. It was the size of my thumb and curved in a smooth arc with minuscule forms of arms and legs and an unmistakable head. At the same time that the realization hit me what I was looking at, the smell hit me. It was the smell of death. It was the reek of something that I should never have seen. It was the overwhelming stink of crushed hope.
My scream was swallowed by the sob and whatever restraint I had left in me. My body shuddered and spasmed in shock. In that moment, I dropped the toilet paper and the gut-wrenching thing in it. The plop as it dropped into the water in the toilet was sickening. I panicked and cast about for what to do next. In my frantic state, I did the only thing I could do.
I flushed the toilet.
The horror and rapidly blossoming guilt of what I had just done smacked me in the head as I watched the swirling water sweep everything away. I splayed my hands on either side of the stall walls and sobbed, my tears freely dripping and following into the water behind my tiny baby. I don’t have any idea how long I was in there. I finally went back to the office, but I didn’t take the phones back. I went in the back door and slipped into the library, closing the door behind me. I took the phone from the table and curled up on the floor, still crying quietly. Slowly, painfully, I dialed the number for home.
R realized that I was crying and was immediately concerned. I could not tell him that I was okay because I wasn’t. At the same time, I couldn’t tell him what I needed because I didn’t know. At one point, DJ opened the door to the library. I looked up at him from where I was in the corner, tears streaming down my cheeks. I can only guess from the look on his face that he knew what was happening. He backed slowly out of the library and closed the door. Finally, I was able to relay to R what had happened. He was nearly as horrified as I had been and wanted me to come home. I had already missed so much work. They probably would have let me go home, but I didn’t want to ask. After some time, we hung up and I went about pulling myself back together. I had to go back to the bathroom to get cleaned up. I never again, in the whole time I worked there, went back into that stall.
The next day, I went to M’s office. I did not have an appointment and the Saturday hours were short, but I asked for her. When she heard that it was me, she met with me in her private office. As soon as the door closed, I asked her the question that had been burning a hole in me since the whole thing began. “Why didn’t you tell me that this would happen? Why didn’t you warn me? I might have made a different decision.” I told her everything that had happened, holding nothing back. In the grand tradition of understated responses when things go so horribly wrong, she replied, “It wasn’t supposed to happen this way.” Ya think?!?
In her words, the fetus that she and the doctor had seen was much smaller. I should not have even noticed when it passed, which should have been while I was bleeding. There was no way I should have felt it and it should not have remained after the bleeding was over. Nothing they saw prepared her in any way for what I was telling her. I described a much more developed fetus than what she saw. The only explanation was that there were two that died at different times and that they didn’t see the second. They would have been fraternal twins in another reality. She admitted that once they saw the smaller, it didn’t occur to them to look for another. Twins often get missed that way with the first sonogram. I was left numb and cold after that. It was a long time before I could forgive her.
We didn’t tell J. It was a decision born of fear and sadness. We were not able to handle our own grief, let alone adding his into the mix. It was also a mistake. He overheard me talking to a close friend and asked me what I was talking about. I refuse to lie to him about something as serious as this, so I told him in the gentlest terms I could manage. He was hurt that we didn’t tell him, hurt that he had lost a sibling, and wanted to know why it happened. He wanted something or someone to blame, to be angry at. I knew how he felt. I wanted that too, but there was nothing and no one to blame when the answer is that sometimes this just happens.
Unfortunately, the only one left to blame when there is no one to blame is God. We all hurt so profoundly and had nowhere else to direct it all, so God became our target. By now, I also didn’t want comfort. I wanted wrath. I wanted uncontrolled fury. It was poisoning me with every breath and I couldn’t get it out. My conversations with God were not prayers in those days. They were not thanks and praise. They were not humble requests. They were one-sided yelling matches that were only one-sided because I could not calm my heart enough to hear His words. Eventually, those rages gave way to tears of guilt for how it ended. Those tears ultimately turned to bitter acceptance.
It never goes away. Healing in this case is remembering without the terrific pressure to cry. People say stupid things like “just have another baby,” or “it’s alright because it wasn’t a real baby,” or “the world is overpopulated, anyway.” Yes, I know, I really heard that. The sad thing is that the person who said it was trying to comfort me. Yeah, ok, whatever. Having another baby is not an indication that the miscarried baby is forgotten. It does not magically make the pain go away. At best, it gives another perspective. If I had carried that baby to term, we would not have our S. While it still hurts, I wouldn’t give S up for anything.
To those who say it is not a real baby, I call bull. I saw my baby, and it was real. The image is burned into my being. It had a head and arms and legs and teeny tiny feet and for the time it lived, a heartbeat. I held it for the briefest of moments and it changed my life from that moment until the end of time. Anyone who tried to tell me that it wasn’t real is simply delusional. In fact, had I not panicked, I would have taken its real little body and buried it properly like the un-flowered bud of a child that it was. I would have mourned it like any parent mourns the loss of a child. Age is no boundary for the love of a mother for her child.
Though it would not have been our baby’s actual birthday, we remember January 13 as her birthday. “It” wasn’t going to cut it, either. We named her Samantha. There is no legal documentation, no grave. Most people do not know that she ever existed. But we know. We remember. We know where she is. We know that God accepted her. He is raising her and that’s all that I need to know. She’s in good company.
Modern medicine estimates that approximately one in three pregnancies end in miscarriage, with most of the women not even realizing that they are pregnant. We are out there in vast numbers. We are silent and we are hurting. We are taboo and we are undone. But we are also made resilient and strong. We are each other’s greatest source of comfort and hope. We are your daughters, sisters, mothers, and friends. We are the Un-mothers, and we are the ones who bring the angels into the world, sometimes without even realizing it. Do not turn your faces from us. We are not contagious. We are not cursed; We are blessed. We are in this world to be a blessing to each other, and in that unity, we break the secrets. We banish the silence. We make it part of who we are and it makes us more compassionate and understanding towards others in a way that only that shared experience can. Never underestimate an Un-mother. We are forged in a painful and passionate fire to be far stronger and more beautiful than even we imagined possible.